Son[i]a #141
Franco Berardi
Franco Berardi, better known as Bifo, is a writer, philosopher and political and cultural activist who has devoted much of his career to studying the relationship between new communication technologies and social movements. The current financial crisis has led him to advocate the need for a creative uprising based on the reactivation of empathy and social solidarity, in order to stand up to the financial tyranny.
Berardi actively participated in the 1968 student riots that were organised at the University of Bologna, and in the 1977 Movement in that same city, which brought together the revolutionary efforts of a group of intellectuals, artists and students who called themselves Mao-Dadaists. Around that same time he co-founded Radio Alice, Italy’s first free radio, and the magazine A/Traverso.
In 2000, he collaborated in the implementation of Telestreet (2002-2004), a network of local televisions that soon spread to several Italian cities as a weapon against the Mediaset monopoly. He currently teaches social history of the media at the Accademia di Belle Arti di Brera in Milan, and is part of the teaching staff at SCEPSI (European School for Social Imagination) in San Marino.
Son[i]a joins Franco Berardi in analysing possible strategies for insurrection and citizen resistance in the face of the crisis that currently hangs over Europe.
Mark Fisher
The cultural impact of Mark Fisher's work continues to grow years after his death in 2017. His tough but always accessible dissection of the system and its endemic problems was captured in essays, posts, and books, such as Capitalist Realism, which gave rise to this conversation. The book explores the dangerous connection between neoliberalism and mental health, almost as a tragic portent of his death, although it is much more than that. In the podcast, Fisher talks about the avalanche of repercussions of the 2008 financial crash, particularly in relation to the idea of capitalism as the only possible framework.
Franco "Bifo" Berardi
Bifo talks about mass killings in relation to cinema, mental health, neuroplasticity, friendship, irony and, ultimately, hope.
Deleted scenes
We dig up some unreleased fragments of the interview with the writer, philosopher and political and cultural Franco Berardi.
Radio Alice
RADIOACTIVITY looks into two seminal free radio stations – Radio Alice in Bologna and Radio Tomate in Paris – as singular case studies in which self-management, decentralised organisation and DIY coincide. The mini-series is an introduction to the free radio movement that sprung up in several countries in the seventies as a way of giving voice to actors who were outside the media establishment: an alternative to the dominant narrative that can also be seen as precursor of the horizontal rhizome structure of digital networks.
Franco Berardi "Bifo"
Interview with Franco Berardi "Bifo" and extract from the sound work by Marcel Broodthaers "Interview with a Cat", 1970.